Analysis: With gun control, Obama takes political chance

Jan. 16, 2013
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President Obama announces his administration's new gun law proposals in the Eisenhower Executive Office building January 16, 2013 in Washington, DC. The president unveiled a package of gun control proposals that include universal background checks and bans on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines. / Chip Somodevilla Getty Images

by Aamer Madhani and David Jackson, USA TODAY

by Aamer Madhani and David Jackson, USA TODAY

WASHINGTON - The beauty of a second term presidency, at least for the man in the Oval Office, is that political calculations become less important as he considers policies he wants to pursue.

President Obama's sweeping gun-safety agenda laid out Wednesday reflects just that reality as he called on Americans to get behind a dramatic plan that he believes can help stem gun violence.

In a little over a month since the school shooting in Newtown, Conn., Obama and the White House mapped out a plan that gun-control proponents immediately embraced as bold and ambitious while critics blasted it as overreaching.

At the heart of his agenda are calls to close background-check loopholes, make schools safer, increase access to mental health services and, most controversially, ban the sale of assault weapons and high-capacity magazines -all measures that will require congressional action.

Obama vowed to use "whatever weight this office holds" to make his gun-safety proposals a reality, but put the onus on Congress, who he said will have to act if there is to be meaningful action.

To that end, he called on Americans to question lawmakers on where they stand on some of the most divisive issues, including a ban on assault weapons and establish universal background checks.

"The only way we can change is if the American people demand it,"' Obama said.

Obama also sought to put voter pressure on the powerful National Rifle Association and, particularly, its supporters in Congress:

"Ask them what's more important: Doing whatever it takes to get an A grade from the gun lobby that funds their campaigns? Or giving parents some piece of mind when they drop their child off to first grade?"

A ban on assault weapons ban was first passed into the law in 1994, but it expired in 2004. Obama has long backed a move to reinstate a ban, but there's been little political will to get it back on the books.

Even after last month's tragedy in Connecticut, where the gunman used a military-style Bushmaster rifle loaded with 30 rounds and more high-capacity clips at the ready, Americans remain opposed to such a ban. A USA TODAY/Gallup Poll last month showed that 51% oppose outlawing assault weapons, while 44% support it.

Perhaps of more concern to the president at the moment are comments by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid suggesting that the ban has little chance of getting through Congress.

"Let's be realistic. In the Senate, we're going to do what we think can get through the House," Reid, the top Senate Democrat, told a Nevada PBS station over the weekend. "And I'm not going to be going through a bunch of these gyrations just to say we've done something because if we're really legislators, the purpose of it is to pass legislation."

The White House insists that the call to re-institute the ban is not a pie-in-the-sky effort, and suggests that Obama will lean into the effort.

But even some supporters of reinstating an assault-weapons ban say a hard push by Obama is not without risks, and the president may be best served by putting his political capital into measures such as universal background checks, cracking down on gun trafficking and improving data collection and sharing among federal agencies.

"Those are not firearms that anyone needs or should have, but we don't think it will have much impact on gun crime, while other things the president proposes will," said Matt Bennett, a senior vice president at the centrist Democratic group Third Way. "I worry that it's going to dominate the debate when it shouldn't. It's the tail wagging the dog."

Obama, however, clearly believes that Newtown created a moment for more than piecemeal reform.

As he wrapped up his remarks announcing his agenda, he recalled a conversation he had with the family of one of the young victims in Connecticut, Grace McDonnell, 6, who loved the color pink and visiting the beach.

"Most of all, I think about how when it comes to protecting the most vulnerable among us, we must act now, for Grace, for the 25 other innocent children and devoted educators who had so much left to give," Obama said. "Let's do the right thing. Let's do the right thing for them and for this country that we love so much."